To take just one example Bush favours the use of torture to combat terrorism because he considers the threat so great that it's a necessary preventative measure. According to him torture is justified because it has prevented the greater evil of terrorist acts being perpetrated against society. <br><br> I would argue that there is no greater evil than one's own government sanctioning the torture of innocent people. Terrorist acts and torture should both be illegal and over here by the way, they are. What Bush wants to do is to legalise one to prevent the other. The essential fallacy of his argument is in the fact that, since torture is a pre-trial procedure, it could be applied (as we have seen) by some unaccountable person* to someone who is innocent of any wrongdoing. Bush presumes that:<br><br>1. anyone that someone* decides to torture must be guilty or <br><br>2. though not guilty their innocence is a sacrifice worth making for some greater benefit.<br><br>Item 2 above accepts the idea that someone* on behalf of the state should have the power to torture innocent people. There's no need to attempt to change the meaning of the word to disallow only acts resulting in organ failure and all that bullcrap - according to Bush torture is acceptable and that's that.<br><br>However, nobody with any modicum of intelligence would accept the idea of being tortured themselves merely as a means for someone* to obtain information. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the flaw in Bush's argument - that torturing innocent people necessarily means torturing other people and not themselves.<br><br>key: * an unaccountable person is someone* who can do whatever they like.<br><br>km<br><br>

You need to be more clear in your subject lines. I thought you were going to explain why Bush is ignorant. A hunting accident or oxygen deprivation in childhood? Perhaps Jeb wrapped a plastic bag around his head? I would lean more to a genetic problem as the phenotypic penetrance in the entire family is pretty strong. This does not explain the silver fox except that the "saves two others" gene may have kicked in and that is why the ignorance mutation is homozygous and so virulent in the siblings.<br><br><br><br><br><br><br>

You're preaching to the choir here, buddy. Tell us how to stop him from torturing people. Preferably without getting ourselves labeled traitors who can then be tortured for information. The truth is that anyone who followed Bush's career from the time he was a kid until present (as we Texans were forced to do through our newspapers), knows that he's always had a mean streak in him. He's a rich kid. He thinks that non-rich kids are for bullying, and that his "class" gives him the right to do anything he wants while making anyone else pay any price for getting in his way. He came to blows with his dad in the front lawn one drunken night. For his repeated brushes with the law, he was forced to do some community service. He was assigned a little black kid to be a big brother to. He made out like it was his decision, that he chose to do that, that he loved working with little black kids. So, early on he learned that he could take punishment and turn it into good press. He failed in business again and again, but he knew dad would bail him out, because it wouldn't look good for him to fail. <br><br>He took a job offered by Dad's friends to be a front-man for the Texas Rangers Baseball Team. He was dubbed its manager/owner, but in fact he was just "image-maker." His dad was president. This gave the real owners tremendous political clout in Arlington, Texas, where they wanted to build a new stadium. They would have to take a lot of land from homeowners by way of eminent domain, and Dubya would be the guy to drum up public support for that very unpopular idea. It worked, and they got their stadium. The people even gladly paid for it, even though it wouldn't be theirs. Then Dubya became governor. <br><br>As governor, he never exercised clemency in death penalty cases, except for one. The one case he pardoned was for Texas worst mass murderer. Odd... that seemed an act of cruelty to our citizenry. To pardon the one guy who was truly guilty? Why? Because they could not be sure how many he killed. Never mind that any way you looked at it, the guy killed more than anyone else. BEcause there was some doubt on a few of the 40-odd killings he admitted to, Dubya pardoned him. Meanwhile, the lady who had reformed in jail, had become Christian, had ministered to other inmates, and so on, asked for clemency, just to be removed from death row and serve a life sentence. Bush mocked her and laughed, mimicking her in a high-pitched voice squeaking "don't kill me, don't kill me..." and laughing. Even friends thought that one was over-the-top. She was put to death, of course. <br><br>I could go on, but it's pointless. It can all be summed up in his willingness to torture while distancing himself from it, as though he didn't have any part of the action. That's how he does everything. He appoints people to do his dirty work for him, and he always ALWAYS pretends that he had nothing to do with it, but as the authority, he simply has to back his advisors who know more than he does. <br><br>I fully expected him to torture prisoners. It just was inevitable. It fit his personality too much. But I thought someone would stop him. I really did. I thought he would get blasted for it, and maybe impeached. That's one of many things that I thought would happen as others restrained his out-of-control dictatorship. But nobody stopped him. Ever. <br><br>You want to protest at a Bush event? You'll be arrested, and/or sent to a distant place where you can protest all you want behind a fence and surrounded by dump trucks so that nobody can see you. That's another Bush trademark: dump trucks to block protesters. <br><br>The damage is done. In just 9 more months, 10 actually, someone else will take charge. There is a 2/3 chance that it will be just another version of Bush. Under either McCain or Hillary Clinton, the torture will continue. Only Obama offers hope to stop that, to bring back the lost Constitution, and to start backing down from the war. Whoever gets it will inherit the worst economy in the history of the USA. With currency on the verge of collapse, as more and more 3rd world countries are forced to trade in Euros, thus flooding the market with their stashes of dollars, we're likely to see disaster unfold in people's savings, retirement plans, and earnings. Bush doesn't care. His people are taken care of. That's all that ever mattered to him. <br><br>Shooshie<br><br><br><br><br><br>[color:green]Pictures and things</font color=green>

Yeah but for all that nearly 50 per cent of you wanted him as President When you ask "tell us how to stop him from torturing people" there's no quick fix I'm afraid. If you really want to know you have to as a society uphold universal values long-term rather than suddenly recall them after the event when it's too late.<br><br>km<br><br>

<br> WOW! Can we have you framed? <br>..or bronzed?<br>...or at least pressed in a book? <br><br>You may be the last person on Earth<br>that believes he won those elections.<br><br><br><br>[color:green]"...or am I a butterfly that's dreaming she's a woman?"</font color=green> [color:green]. . . _ _ _ . . .</font color=green><br>

_________________________."...or am I a butterfly dreaming she's a woman?"

[color:blue]You may be the last person on Earth that believes he won those elections.</font color=blue><br><br>I don't think he said that at all .... "almost 50%" holds true regardless of how crooked the Florida count may have been. <br>More than 50% voted for him the second time around and some 70% supported the Iraq invasion. Here as well!<br>Voting for war means voting for killing and atrocities. After WWII and Vietnam, nobofy could possibly claim ignorance of that fact.<br><br>km2: ".... you have to as a society uphold universal values long-term rather than suddenly recall them after the event when it's too late." Gutsy words in a basically America forum. ;)<br><br>Letting these people get away with what they did and allowing the name of your nation to be besmirched, responsibility for that rests with all Americans "as a society": those, who actively voted for the gang, and the others, who didn't (dare) do enough, to object to the wrongs they apparently perceived. <br><br>Under Hitler or Stalin, objection meant certain death. It was never even close to that under Bush. As Shoosh writes: "Tell us how to stop him from torturing people. Preferably without getting ourselves labeled traitors who can then be tortured for information."<br>Having to take risks for freedom and justice is not something, which people in well-to-do countries are good at. Too much to lose.<br>That's why I feel honoured to sing each Tuesday evening with a bunch of people, who in 1989, did in fact risk everything, when they stood outside the church chanting "Wir sind das Volk!" ("We are the People")<br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br>

<blockquote><font size=1>In reply to:</font><hr><p>Gutsy words in a basically America forum.<p><hr></blockquote><p>I know that some people won't like it but Shoosh asked the question and it would be impolite not to answer it. Bush is clearly impeachable over Iraq and specifically in relation to torture for abrogating the US commitment to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. However, because there was insufficient clarity before these events that the nation's commitment to its word was sacrosanct we see that Congress now lacks the capital to act on Bush's failures.<br><br>km<br><br>

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